As American citizens, in all our diversity, what is the one thing we should all know?

[mix]

For me, it is the mass death and cultural genocide (and the subsequent survival of Native American communities) that European colonization after 1492 and then Manifest Destiny in the 19th century wrought upon this continent and upon the Americas in general.

[taterguy]

1. Russell was better than Wilt

Rings before scoring titles

[mix]

3. true

but with today's kids it's all Kobe Jordan LeBron

[Greyhound]

29. False.

No athlete has ever impacted his/her game like Wilt did.

[taterguy]

35. I was undecided about the issue until I found out that Wilt never fouled out of a game

Once he got 4 or 5 fouls he'd just stop playing D.

Wilt was all about individual achievements, which disqualifies you from being the greatest player in a team sport, no matter how impressive those achievements are.

The teammates of Wilt and Russ had comparable levels of talent; but Russell made his teammates better, which is why Russell has so many rings.

Besides, Wilt let himself get psyched out by Frank McGuire and that chicken-shit bunch of carpet baggers from New York/Chapel Hill. A truly great player would never let that happen.

[Greyhound]

86. Good points. n/t

[H2O Man]

41. Ali

(Plus after calling Wilt out on his pathetic challenge on national tv, Wilt chickened out.)

[grantcart]

46. "I knew"

"I knew how good he was, he knew I knew how good he was, I knew he knew I knew how good he was and he knew I knew he knew I knew how good he was, and that's how I beat him".

Paraphrased but basically the greatest quote in the history of sports explaining how Russell played to WC vanity by allowing him to score an unlimited amount of points and shut down the rest of the team allowing the Boston team to outscore Wilt and win the championships.

My favorite athelete of all time, probably the smartest to have ever picked up a ball.

[taterguy]

49. Technically, Bill Bradley may have been smarter

But only if you're counting "book smarts"

:toast:

[leftstreet]

2. There were people here before us?

K&R

[RKP5637]

4. I've never thought the original owners of these lands have been celebrated enough! n/t

[galileoreloaded]

5. The one thing we all should know????

Cash talks, and bullshit walks..........

[Historic NY]

6. We all bleed the same color & breath the same air, on this small dot of a planet.

[mix]

7. +1

[lunatica]

8. Our real history

Instead of the glorified propaganda we've been fed since pre-school. When you don't tell the truth you get the Teabag Party.

[mix]

9. That is the truth,

The Teabaggers are the best evidence of how decayed our public education system is and how lies and ignorance have replaced knowledge and critical thinking in public discourse among too many Americans.

[Fire1]

27. True. I always manage to slide the truth in there. Sometimes

it opens a can of worms but it certainly does make for in depth lessons and lively discussions.

[Catshrink]

10. That our Founders did not want a "Christian Nation" and some of them weren't Christian themselves

and meant the separation of church and state.

[mix]

11. essential knowledge nt

[Subdivisions]

12. The things I've learned over the years about this country have

horrified me. It's like, once you move from elementary school and the Pledge of Allegiance, and once you start to really think critically, it becomes increasingly apparent that the nation we live has wrought death and destruction throughout it's history.

It's like waking from a nightmare only to discover that you weren't asleep.

[mix]

13. well said

The question, then, is how do we use the ugly truths of our history to make a better country and world?

Most would simply prefer to forget them and carry on...but denial and repression take their tolls.

[vadawg]

14. you do realise that what you are talking about is actually the human race in its entirety

every nation and peoples have done shit, hell even the native americans were busy killing each other before the europeans came and probuably would have continued doing so if they hadnt..

[mix]

15. How does that dubious claim exonerate the USA from its historical crimes? nt

[vadawg]

16. it dosent, but you got to know that every country has crimes, and no peoples are pure

hence its the nature of mankind that we are talking about and not just something that is peculiar to the US...

ps not sure what is dubious about what i wrote, unless you want to hide the bad stuff everybody else did...

[mix]

19. I disagree that this is "the nature of mankind."

Countries, peoples, communities, cultures, and societies, throughout history, have shown the ability, talent and imagination to live without war and expansion. Postwar Sweden and West Germany, the Pueblos of the southwest, most hunter-gatherers. War is of course an historical fact of human history, but so are attempts to avoid and live without it.

Even if your claim were true empirically, and it simply is not, its purpose is first and foremost to assuage the guilt and hide the crimes and mistakes of our country.

We as a diverse nation need to face these ugly truths and learn from them...otherwise we will not progress and heal.

[vadawg]

20. so you need to face the ugly truths about the native peoples as well

as well as the history of sweden and wwest germany and as i said every group of humans at one time or another, americans and the US is not exceptional when it comes to doing ugly stuff its just the easiest one sometimes to blame.

[mix]

22. As citizens, this is our country and we are responsible ethically for

what our country does and has done throughout history.

How can it be otherwise?

It is merely a distraction to bring "the nature of mankind" or other groups into this discussion.

American citizens need to deal with this country's history, the good and the bad, not strive to "put things into perspective."

[vadawg]

23. rofl okay, so its only the european americans that we can criticise and america since the europeans

came here, okay you go right ahead but nothing happens in a vaccuum and without putting stuff into context and with perspective then you are not going to get any answers...

[Taitertots]

58. I'm not ethically responsible for things that happened 100 years before was born

Are all living Germans responsible for the Holocaust?
Are all living Muslims responsible for the acts of the caliphs?

[mix]

64. Your last 2 questions are for you to decide on your own.

As far as your subject line, if you live in the USA, the present moment you have inherited and are now experiencing has a deep history that begins with the wholesale destruction of Native American cultures, mass death, and the theft of a continent.

Those of us who have inherited this historical reality are obligated, I believe, to heal these wounds.

Admitting that we as individuals and as a nation have such a history would be a good first step and is the basis of responsible citizenship.

[vadawg]

66. in that vain how far back should people be apoligising and healing wounds

should all italians apoligise for the destruction of carthage, or the normans for killing angles, or the numerous other deeds in the past, i dont feel i have any need to heal any wounds other than those i am obligated to through the history of my family, and even then the ones that happened before i was born i feel even less obligated for.

[Taitertots]

73. Heal the wounds?

My family wasn't even in America when that happened. I'm not going to do anything for people 100 years separated from something I had nothing to do with.

One thing, I'm not going to support giveaways to people because their great-great-great grandpa may or may not have been killed.

[Larry Ogg]

45. The collective nature of mankind is not the genetic nature of all individuals!

But to be more specific, change the word "nature" to "character"; because in order to understand why a large portion of a collective (but not the whole collective) can be misled and molded into an irrational and murderous mob mentality; one really needs to be able to understand the character of individuals, i.e. character traits that are not universal between all humans. And to be more specific again, most people are able to set their differences aside, get along and work together for the common good; let’s call that "modus vivendi." But there is a small portion of individuals known as psychopaths and they are genetic predators, and they have the uncanny ability to deceive the majority of individuals, especially conservatives, into following some sort of mob mentality or even a right wing authoritarian tyrannies, whether they be ideologies of monarchies, communism or capitalism makes no difference; so let’s call the psychopaths ability "modus operandi" because there are specific things that they do that can be observed as they rise to the top of social power structures, witch allows them to lead entire societies unsuspectingly down the paths of things like war and eventual self destruction.

Realistically if social power was taken away from psychopaths who might consist of 6% to 10% of the human population, the rest of us would learn to get along just fine; because the sheep outnumber the wolves 10 to 1, they just need to stop letting the wolves be their leaders.

[vadawg]

53. good post, but you know as well as i do that the wolves may be outnumbered but they will win

just by the fact that it takes more than 10 sheep to take down a wolf, and even the sheep dont want to be sheep but want to be wolves. You say most people can put their differences aside and its true but the issue is that we all have different goals so we will work together so far and then the goals diverge and may be at odds with each other.

[Larry Ogg]

83. Historically wolves are winning at the end of good times,

but it's also the end of a cycle when you look at the rise and fall of empires; because it's during the good times that the collective society gets lazy and drops its guard, almost literally letting the wolves guard the hen house.

The reason predators win, even though they are out numbered 10 to 1, is that people of conscience have historically been totally clueless that some people - as in psychopaths - have no conscience; unfortunately psychopaths are naturally aware of their condition and they look at people of conscience as being weak and inferior pawns that should be used in whatever means that pleases the psychopath. Unfortunately for the psychopaths, the truth is becoming known more and more among the people of conscience, which means the predator classes days are numbered. The only question that remains is... Will they burn the empire to the ground before to many people learn the truth.

One more thing; their is no denying that people of conscience do bad things, but for the most part they are capable of working out their differences without destroying each other; you just have to take out the motives and influence of the predator; only then will the human race reach its full potential...

[conservdem]

18. Why do you think it's dubious?

If it's correct, it would not exonerate the USA, but it would put things in perspective.

[Hugabear]

21. Because it is dubious revisionistic bullshit

Yes, there have been cases in the past where tribes or nations have gone through genocidal expansionism, killing or enslaving anyone in their path. We also tend to not look very kindly on those. But not EVERY nation or group of people engaged in such behavior. And as for the argument that the Native Americans engaged in the same type of behavior - BULLSHIT. Yes, some tribes might have engaged in brutal wars with their neighbors, but not on the wholesale systematic scale that the Europeans and later the United States did. To say that "well everyone else has done it" is simplistic, revisionist bullshit in an attempt to lessen the severity of what happened on this continent.

[vadawg]

24. okay so because they didnt have the ability to do it, means that their attempts should be sugar coat

coated, honestly you can beat up on past deeds done by you but its not something that peculiar to the US, its something that has happened all over the world and by all peoples. Do you really think that if one tribe couldnt have wiped out its enemies with ease it wouldnt...

[mix]

25. Your assumptions are running wild.

But your denial and revisionism are crystal clear.

[vadawg]

26. rofl what assumptions, answer me this, did the tribes kill people from other tribes

did some tribes disappear due to being destroyed by others, thats simply what i said, that its the same as happened to peoples all over the planet..

[mix]

28. sounds like you roll on the floor a lot

No-one is denying that war, violent conflict, and expansion are facts of human history. But are they the omnipresent, absolute fact of that history. Are they the eternal fate of all societies and peoples? Are they so ingrained in human behavior that they are "the nature of mankind"?

No, of course not.

Historically, beginning with Europe imperialism and the Wars of Religion and continuing seamlessly into the present, this has been a long period of mass death and large-scale warfare. But even within this horrific time, people have been able to live in peace--no matter how fleeting. And thankfully this value endures because so do the wars.

[vadawg]

32. okay so tell me is it only european imperialism and religious wars that started this horrific time

or do you also look at the mass human sacrifices of the ancient americans, the death and conquest between the african kingdoms, what about the far east, the persian empire, seems that your history seems to start only in the last few hundred years or so, you do realise that even during times of peace people have always known that they have to prepare for war just in case, this wasnt just because they knew their history, they also understand their own nature and the nature of the people around them...

[mix]

33. Yes, these two factors, along with industrialization, capitalism and liberal democracy, which

has historically been expansionist (there are rare exceptions), are mostly responsible for this period of war...the ideological wars of the 20th century between fascism, communism, and liberalism, were a variation of this dynamic.

My point is that as American citizens we are responsible for our own history, uniquely, not that of other cultures and societies who commit similar mistakes and atrocities. We have the ability to change the direction and thinking of our own country. We cannot do this to the Mexica, for example, no matter how much we abhor many of their practices.

You are really talking about something entirely different than I am.

[vadawg]

34. mayby we are, but also isnt the america you are talking about made up of people from all these other

cultures that have committed all these things, so were do you place the blame for all the stuff the US has done,

[H2O Man]

44. Correct.

Not surprising.

There was violent aggression in Central America, and the northern part of South America, in pre-Columbian times. However, it was entirely connected with "empire." The person you are responding to has little knowledge of Native American history in the context of North America. Warfare was, in fact, not practiced, as it was, by definition, unknown. The concept was against the lifestyle those cultures practiced.

[vadawg]

47. okay there was no warfare, but did they kill each other, and raid each other

and take captives, and burn villages etc etc, you know all the stuff that happens in war or was it more formal and just two champions fighting ala david and goliath...

[mix]

48. Agriculture tied to large city-states seems to be a prerequisite of such imperial warfare.

Mayan, Inka, and Aztec empires share that feature. Without the food to support them, empires could not field armies.

Among semi-nomadics and hunting and gathering peoples, there were conflicts of course over resources and territory, but little evidence of Hobbesian scenarios. In fact, there is evidence of cooperation and resolution, such as intermarriage, between conflicting groups as a way to peacefully mediate relations.

Our times have been and continue to be so brutal and violent, 100s of millions slaughtered globally since 1492, and because of this many often assume that is the way it has always been.

Ahistorical thinking to say the least.

[vadawg]

50. so you deny or do you admit that the tribal societies that existed in teh US

fought and killed each other, raided each other, took captives, made truces, made alliances etc much the same as every other society across the planet, yes the poster is right in that im not really interested in the native tribes in a historical sense, i dont really have an interest in that period or the region then, so im interested in how you think they were not the same as the other tribal peoples across the world who fought wars though mayby limited against each other...

[mix]

52. It is clear where I stand.

We as American citizens only have the power to change our society and its thinking about the past.

[vadawg]

54. so are you allowed to say bad stuff about the indigenious peoples of the US

and their cultures and i dont mean bigotted stuff, i mean that they had their share of bad cats and actions as well. You do realise that if you are looking at history you have to take the good and the bad and look at the context of the times, we cant look to peoples actions in the past and ascribe our own motives to how they acted and what they did... We have to look dispassionately at what happened in order to understand..

[mix]

57. With regards to history,

what you "say" must be grounded in social scientific evidence, as well as vetted by others.

If your opinions meet that criteria, then you may make an historical assertion.

But never expect not to be challenged.

:hi:

[H2O Man]

59. Right. If a person

admits to having little interest in a subject, and offers no evidence whatsoever to back up their claims, it should be expected that those with an interest and knowledge will challenge them. Well said. I agree.

[vadawg]

65. rofl so once again i ask you in order to learn something, did the native peoples

kill each other, take captives, do raids, have truces etc the same as all other societies across the planet, see there you go im asking a simple question in order to gain knowledge...

[mix]

70. Just read my posts here, I won't repeat what I've already stated.

and get off the damn floor

:hi:

[vadawg]

71. im having issues today, sorry im on adouble shift so im fecking tired

and ive got 100 guys bitching at me cause its valentines day and either their girls havent came to visit or if they did they as my jailhouse lawyer informed me of his girl "shes spent to much of his money at the burrito stand" lol dude your in jail for 5 years what did you expect..... i hope you dont think i was attacking you, im just not into blaming people for stuff they did to my people generations ago or even before i was born.... :)

[mix]

72. sounds intense...check out this book, "1491"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1491:_New_Revelations_of_the_Americas_Before_Columbus

hang in there !

[H2O Man]

88. What's always interesting to me

is when a vocal individual or coordinated small group comes up with all the talking points being promoted by those forces that seek to profit by continued theft from Native Peoples. Of course, I am not suggesting that these people are all suspect. Many are simply ignorant, and parroting the lines they have heard before. And, just like parrots, though they say the words, they have no idea what they are talking about.

A classic example is the "I feel no 'guilt' about what happened 200 years ago." No one asks them to. In fact, no one can do anything about what happened 200 or 100 years ago. No dam ever built can hold back waters that spilled yesterday.

However, progressive and liberal democrats should care about current events. When business interests and their puppets in government continue to deny Native People their legal rights -- and by "legal," I include treaty rights, which are covered in our Constitution. This is happening here and now, and while it is definitely related to what took place in previous centuries, it is distinct. We can do something about it today.

A second bullshit line being promoted by those interested in the theft of Native American's resources today is: "But all people engaged in warfare way back when. The early Americans only did what everyone else was doing. Gosh, even the Indians did the exact same thing!" This, of course, is not even close to true. As Martin Luther King, Jr., noted, the US is the only nation that as a matter of government policy promoted the genocide of its Indigenous Peoples.

I could provide numerous other examples of this type of talking point. But I do not need to -- one can find them posted on most DU threads regarding Native American current events.

[mix]

91. Awareness and responsibility towards the present are what I would like to see.

A classic example is the "I feel no 'guilt' about what happened 200 years ago." No one asks them to. In fact, no one can do anything about what happened 200 or 100 years ago. No dam ever built can hold back waters that spilled yesterday.

Beautifully put, yet the present confronts us.

We still must deal with that cultural and human loss, which pervades our present, and take the time to understand how history has caused it.

It is our history, regardless of whether we claim it or not.

[vadawg]

63. yup no problem, im actually a big fan of history, always inteested me

i always think its interesting how people of different cultures and historys see the interaction between themselves and other tribes so to speak.

[Hugabear]

62. That's hardly the equivalent of conquering an entire fucking continent just because you can

You simply cannot expect most of us to believe that whatever the Native Americans did to each other was the same as the treatment inflicted upon Native Americans in the name of "Manifest Destiny".

[vadawg]

69. not saying it is, im just saying that if you were part of a family group that was eradicated

then you dont really care if it was part of a larger plan do you, my whole point is that both sides did shit to each other and to themselves and in the end the side that had the numbers and the tech won, much the same as happens across the world...

[H2O Man]

51. Right.

City-states require the natural resources of outlying areas. An obvious example, in today's context, would be NYC's need to "import" food products.

Agrarian communities can produce the surplus that becomes accumulated wealth. That allows for a stratified society. And that eventually fosters the tensions with neighboring and/or more distant communities.

An interesting addition to the surplus wealth that is found in cultures near the equator is the religious symbolism, which is not common to the north or south. In the global sense, it has helped create a greater potential for certain types of violence. In the Americas, that limited experience is far too often mistakenly applied to the people of North and South America, as we see in this thread.

[conservdem]

36. I am not trying to saying that everyone else has done the same or

that if that were true it would erase current or historical wrongs of Europeans and the US. But I think it would be revisionist bullshit to suggest that the US is the only nation guilty of such acts.

[mix]

37. Who has ever done this? nt

[conservdem]

38. Mix, I thought you did with your reply #15.

In any event, I want to see humanity learn from all history and avoid wars and inhumane treatment of others. I also think can move in this direction.

[vadawg]

42. nope it will never happen, there are always going to be people with differeing ideas

that run opposed to your ideas and what can you do, force them to concede to your ideals and you are just enforcing your will on others the same as as always happened. Its all pie in the sky stuff if people believe that everyone is going to agree on everything and no one is going to fight or kill for some other belief, hell humans will kill each other over imaginary fruit if given the chance..

[mix]

43. I agree, but it is only in our power to change our society and deal with our past.

“The past is not dead. In fact, it's not even past.” William Faulkner

:hi:

[conservdem]

75. I think one nation can lead, and thus influence other nations to do the

right thing.

I do not think I agree with Faulkner about the past.

Aside from learning of and avoiding repeating historical wrongs do you suggest there is other ways to "deal" with our past?

[mix]

76. If you have a memory, you have a history.

And as citizens, we all have individual and collective memories--some similar, many not.

It does not matter if we have no personal or family ties to the history of this country, as someone argued elsewhere in this thread. The present is constituted by forces larger than ourselves. And we inherit the totality of that history, as citizens, and must grapple with its glories and crimes.

Most deal with this fact by denying any part in that history despite inheriting the present.

[vadawg]

77. good point, but we should be allowed to question whether we should feel any guilt

and be able to say we dont, i would hate to take on the burden of guilt from my forefathers sins as im sure you would too.

[conservdem]

85. I think we should be able to question whether we should feel any

guilt for historical wrongs. I am glad some of these wrongs have been acknowledged and apologies have been made for some. I do wonder about this issue and admit I have felt some guilt about some of our nation's past. I also feel proud about many parts of our past.

[conservdem]

17. Interesting point. I wonder if it's correct. I tend to think it is.

[ipaint]

30. Great wealth can't exist without the support of widespread poverty and neglect.

Excessive wealth creates and sustains poverty.

[mix]

31. Class relations are another historical topic that Americans are in denial about. nt

[Codeine]

39. +1 nt

[Codeine]

40. The offside trap is a dangerous gamble. nt

[pitohui]

79. heh heh and yet w/out gambling life itself could not exist EOM

.

[grantcart]

55. The Tulsa Race Riot was a race riot in that whites went crazy going so

far to drop bombs on Greenwood, the most successful Black township east of Harlem (known as "the Black Wall Street" and wiped it out of existence.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulsa_Race_Riot



After WWI Black Veterans were able to return from the war with their weapons, just like White Veterans. A well armed black population scared the Okies senseless and after a Black militia showed up to help the Sheriff to hold off a lynch mob the White population went crazy and went on a blood lust killing spree that probably killed more people than died on 9/11.

For some reason none of the history books I had in school ever reported on this 'minor' incident that included whites dropping incidiary devices from planes as they tried to wipe the city of Greenwood off of the map.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenwood,_Tulsa,_Oklahoma











Walking through the lynch mob to the Courthouse steps, Dr. Charles W. Kerr recognised almost everyone in the crowd: The lynch mob consisted of the most prominent citizens of Tulsa: All the great oil magnates, the most important businessmen and the leading bankers, the City's civic and social leaders, Tulsa's pompous 'builders' and 'boosters'. Later, Dr. Kerr declared that they were 'definitely not poor white trash -- who usually get blamed for such lynchings'. Members of this socially prominent lynch mob of oil-wealthy Tulsans hid their faces and slunk into the shadows or ducked behind others when they saw that Dr. Kerr recognised them. To protect the guilty, Dr. Charles W. Kerr never told anyone - except Mrs. Kerr - exactly 'who' it was he saw in the lynch mob. Later, all he would ever say was that it was 'a very well- dressed lynch mob, the night was quite dark, and that by night … 'all cats are black'.'

(That very summer these socially prominent Tulsa 'cats' would by the thousands don the equally anonymous 'white' of the Ku Klux Klan to mask the guilt of their terrible racial crimes in Greenwood with the Klan's racial doctrine and burned Jesus' Cross in livid racial and religious hatred of anyone 'different' from their poor white-origin selves.)

Later, He told Mrs. Anna Elizabeth Coe Kerr their names but put her under her Marital Vow of Obedience never to reveal them: To protect the guilty. The entire community without exception -- sheep from every flock -- were guilty of the terrible racial crimes about to be committed. These same 'community leaders' had also recently participated in various other recent Tulsa lynchings. Mrs. Kerr always said that their socially prominent names would be found amongst the membership rolls of all the socially elite downtown churches and the City's most exclusive country clubs. Persons whom today would be known as 'the Tulsa Establishment'.

Sensing his purpose in coming, the lynch mob yelled at Dr. Charles W. Kerr, 'Quit being a Nigger lover for once and join us!'. Much cursing, cussing and blasphemy.

Dr. Kerr made his way to Courthouse steps. Oblivious to the sea of foaming hatred swirling about him, Dr. Kerr climbed to top step of the Courthouse where the Sheriff was peaking out the door at growing lunch mob: Obvious fear this huge lynch mob of Tulsa 's best 'Magic Empire' citizens will attack the Courthouse with everyone inside.

On the top of the Courthouse steps, Dr. Charles W. Kerr surveyed this gigantic Tulsa lynch mob -- as if from a pulpit: Members of all of Tulsa's Christian dominations without exception, Reformed and un-Reformed, alike, were amongst the lynch mob on that May night: Of all the various faiths in Tulsa, only the Jews were absent from the Courthouse that long ago night late in May. (The Rabbi later told Dr. Kerr that Jews had experienced similar things in Europe and knew that they would be next.)

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=&imgrefurl=http://www.kerr-of-ardgowan.com/7.html&usg=__9qPCRyoqw7WOhZPGytaV_rfAyT8=&h=274&w=555&sz=19&hl=en&start=16&um=1&itbs=1&tbnid=4Q8XtJO74yCHIM:&tbnh=66&tbnw=133&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dtulsa%2Brace%2Briot%26hl%3Den%26um%3D1

[mix]

56. This thread, and all its posts, is EXACTLY why I love DU.

I always learn here.
:thumbsup:

[Cleita]

60. Not only know it but be very ashamed of it as it is still going on. n/t

[anonymous171]

61. That the owners of capital are the cause of all our ills, past and present

[readmoreoften]

67. +1 (Well, the cause of all ills at least since absolute monarchy.)

And that includes the corruption of the Russian Revolution through war communism after 14 nations attacked the new Soviet Republic at the end of WWI, fomenting total civil war. Stalinism was possible because the working class had been completely annihilated in Russia through imperialist war and imperialist-funded civil war and the only folks left were limping, unemployed (declassed) workers and the former bourgeoisie.

First thing Stalin did was kill all the original Bolsheviks.

[anonymous171]

74. Stalinism was possible because of Leninism.

What killed the "Soviet Republic" was the elitist vanguard system (supported by both Trotsky and Lenin), not imperialist wars.

Chomsky says it better than I do though: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yQsceZ9skQI


In America, capitalists have been the root cause of all our most evil deeds. The Genocide of the Native Americans was carried out at the behest of business interests because they wanted the land for railroads ("mountain men" had coexisted peacefully with the natives throughout the west years before business moved in.) They encouraged racial hatred and wars of aggression that hurt the nation and have left a permanent scar on our legacy.

[yurbud]

68. the common good requires constant vigilance against theft by the already wealthy

The greedy and corporations have a terminator-like focus on profiting from legal and illegal commerce, and moving public property and tax dollars into their pockets.

Most of us though are inattentive to the political process so long as life is tolerable and the theft is done quietly without drawing attention to itself.

So we only pay attention when the rich start stealing at too fast a pace and too openly. Then we make big changes and go back to sleep for a couple of decades. This should be one of those times of big changes, but the Democrats are refusing to step up to the plate.

[pitohui]

78. whats special or american about hate and ugliness?

if there's one thing every american should know, it's the night sky in the wilderness

that is special

that's what makes it all worthwhile

that's what makes america, america -- a frontier society

people hate and people kill other people because of hate, nothing special or american about that, that's just the story of human nature from the caveman days

there is an explorer whose grave reads something like nov. 13, 1833 -- can't remember who it was now, but he reached the pacific ocean just in time to see 100,000 meteors fall out of the sky

that is america

hatred and ugliness is just humanity, our burden from centuries, nay, millennia before america existed

the sky with a million stars in it, that's the real america we are losing

there is a poem by philip larkin, about england, that is the same idea, since i don't know a poet in america who is equivalent, maybe sideways you can get the idea:

I thought it would last my time -
The sense that, beyond the town,
There would always be fields and farms,
Where the village louts could climb
Such trees as were not cut down;...
You try to get near the sea
In summer . . .
It seems, just now,
To be happening so very fast;
Despite all the land left free
For the first time I feel somehow
That it isn't going to last,

That before I snuff it, the whole
Boiling will be bricked in
Except for the tourist parts -
First slum of Europe: a role
It won't be hard to win,
With a cast of crooks and tarts.

And that will be England gone,
The shadows, the meadows, the lanes,
The guildhalls, the carved choirs.
There'll be books; it will linger on
In galleries; but all that remains
For us will be concrete and tyres....

[Spider Jerusalem]

80. You can blame some of that on lack of immunity to European diseases.

Actually, most of it (smallpox being particularly devastating for a population with no immunity and having been estimated by some sources to have reduced the native population of the Americas by as much as 95%).

And historically, an invader with superior technology and numbers is always going to win out; how many cultures vanished in the imperial expansion of Rome?

[mix]

92. They played an enormous part.

From Cortes' conquest of the Aztecs to the settling of the American West.

European diseases like small pox ran rampant throughout North American in the decades and centuries before Manifest Destiny unleashed the white settler. The horse aided this process by making people more mobile over larger territories. Native cultures were already considerably weakened by the mid-19th century, due primarily to European disease decimating their populations.

[LeftyMom]

81. The automatic transmission is a tool of the devil.

[NoGOPZone]

82. That there was a plot to overthrow FDR in the 30s

A Congressional investigation happened but no one was ever prosecuted.

[Delphinus]

84. That we are all one.

When one is harmed, all are harmed. When one is helped, all are helped in unknown ways.

[Greyhound]

87. The best and the brightest, the leaders and thinkers, none of them know what their doing either,

so do what works best for you.

[Greyhound]

90. They're

[Veruca Salt]

89. You don't talk about fight club.

;-)